MEDIA RELEASE

Kona Stories community bookstore offers many choices for book clubs. Groups meet monthly to discuss books of fiction, travel, memoir, classics or non-fiction. Book groups are free if books are purchased from Kona Stories or a $5 donation is appreciated. Bring a pupu or beverage to share and come prepared to discuss the following books. You can choose to attend any or all of these groups. Kona Stories is located in the Keauhou Shopping Center in the courtyard shops on the KTA side. If you need more information call Brenda or Joy at 808-324-0350 or check it out online at www.konastories.com.

Book clubs meeting this month are:

March 12, 2019 Fiction Group is discussing A Kind of Freedom by Margaret Wilkerson Sexton

Long-listed for the National Book Award
Winner of the Crook’s Corner Prize
Winner of the First Novelist Award from the Black Caucus of the American Library Association
A New York Times Notable Book

Evelyn is a Creole woman who comes of age in New Orleans at the height of World War II. In 1982, Evelyn’s daughter, Jackie, is a frazzled single mother grappling with her absent husband’s drug addiction. Jackie’s son, T.C., loves the creative process of growing marijuana more than the weed itself. He was a square before Hurricane Katrina, but the New Orleans he knew didn’t survive the storm. For Evelyn, Jim Crow is an ongoing reality, and in its wake new threats spring up to haunt her descendants. Margaret Wilkerson Sexton’s critically acclaimed debut is an urgent novel that explores the legacy of racial disparity in the South through a poignant and redemptive family history.

This group meets at 6 p.m. @ Kona Stories Book Store.

March 19, 2019 The Classic Book Group is discussing So Big by Edna Ferber

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize

A brilliant literary masterwork from celebrated author and Algonquin Round Table mainstay Edna Ferber—who also penned other classics including Show Boat, Giant, Ice Palace, Saratoga Trunk, and Cimarron—So Big is a rollicking panorama of Chicago at the turn of the 20th Century. It is the unforgettable story of Selina Peake DeJong, a gambler’s daughter, and her struggles to stay afloat and maintain her dignity and her sanity in the face of marriage, widowhood, and single parenthood. Hailed as a “novel to read and to remember” (New York Times), So Big still resonates with its unflinching view of poverty, sexism, and the drive for success.
So Big is a must-read for fans of contemporary novelists such Willa Cather (O Pioneers!), Pearl S. Buck (The Good Earth), and Marjorie Rawlings (The Yearling).

This group meets at 6 p.m. @ Kona Stories Book Store.

March 26, 2019 Non-Fiction Book Club is discussing: Midnight in Broad Daylight by Pamela Rotner Sakamoto

Alternating between the American and Japanese perspectives, Midnight in Broad Daylight captures the uncertainty and intensity of those charged with the fighting as well as the deteriorating home front of Hiroshima—as never told before in English—and provides a fresh look at the dropping of the first atomic bomb. Intimate and evocative, it is an indelible portrait of a resilient family, a scathing examination of racism and xenophobia, an homage to the tremendous Japanese American contribution to the American war effort, and an invaluable addition to the historical record of this extraordinary time.

This group meets at 6 p.m. @ Kona Stories Book Store.